A hulking steel plant in Middletown,Ā Ohio, is the cityās economic heartbeat as well as a keystoneĀ origin storyĀ ofĀ JD Vance, the hometown senator now running to beĀ Donald Trumpās vice-president.
Its future, however, may hinge uponĀ $500 million in funding from landmark climate legislation that Vance has called a āscamā and is a Trump target for demolition.
In March,Ā Joe Bidenās administrationĀ announcedĀ the USās largest ever grant to produce greener steel, enabling theĀ Cleveland-CliffsĀ facility in Middletown to build one of the largest hydrogen fuel furnaces in the world, cutting emissions by a million tons a year by ditching the coal that accelerates theĀ climate crisisĀ and befouls the air for nearby locals.
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When campaigning for the Senate in 2022, Vance said Bidenās sweeping climate bill is ādumb, does nothing for the environment and will make us all poorer,ā and more recently as vice-presidential candidate called the IRA a āgreen energy scam thatās actually shipped a lot more manufacturing jobs to China.ā
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I had the same skepticism, so I looked into it. The TL;DR is that this isnāt that. Itās not using the hydrogen as a fuel source; itās using it as reactant in the reduction reaction that produces metallic iron from iron oxide, so that it does { FexOy + H2 ā¶ Fe + H2O } instead of { FexOy + CO ā¶ Fe + CO2 }.
(For the record: I completely agree with everything you wrote, except for the small mistake of assuming āhydrogen powered shitā was an accurate description of this particular project.)
TIL!
Thanks for the links